Jeffrey Katzenberg Talks DreamWorks Animation Sequels: Four MADAGASCARS, Three HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGONS and Six KUNG FU PANDAS

One of the year’s best animated films wasn’t a sequel. It was DreamWorks Animation’s How to Train Your Dragon. So naturally they’re making lots of sequels. We already knew that Dragon 2 was greenlit with the original cast returning, but Jeffrey Katzenberg has now explained how far his studio’s sequel-mania extends. Katzenberg tells Empire that the studio is planning for a total of four Madagascar movies, at least three How to Train Your Dragon films, and six installments in the Kung Fu Panda franchise.

Hit the jump for Katzenberg giving minor details on how these franchises are going to keep their stories going.

“So today I can tell you pretty succinctly where Madagascar goes. Ultimately they will come back to New York, and they will come to terms with that, which they will do in this next chapter. Because of the way that movie concludes there’s probably one more for them…”

Let me guess: they discover they’re no longer happy in the New York Zoo and decide to escape back to Madagascar where they can be free. I’m going to bookmark this article and see if I was right when Madagascar 4: Keep the Mediocre Fires Burning hits theaters sometime near the end of the decade.

Katzenberg says that there will be at least three chapters to the How to Train Your Dragon saga, and possibly more since they’re based on a series of eight books. However, the movie was different from the books thus far. Replied Katzenberg:

“Yes. But there are elements of them that actually… as you know, there are many islands in the world of Berk, and different things there, so we’ll see. But right now, today, we know that there are three for sure that we want to tell and there may be more. We haven’t thought, you know, how do we continue beyond that.”

You continue with How To Train Your Audience to Keep Watching in Spite of Eroding Good Will. Or maybe this will be the one DreamWorks franchise that I love provided they don’t run it into the ground.

Katzenberg also says they’ve mapped out all six chapters of Kung Fu Panda. I don’t really see the appeal of the series thus far as the first film seemed to be mostly slapstick and fat jokes. But maybe the sequel, Kung Fu Panda 2, will be an improvement. The film is due out in 3D on May 27, 2011.